When Peter DeBoer clicked on the tube Friday morning, the sight of one of his former pupils dominating at the NHL level put a huge grin on his face.

There was Nazem Kadri, DeBoer’s ex-student with the Kitchener Rangers of the Ontario Hockey League, scoring his first professional hat trick in a 5-4 overtime victory for the Maple Leafs against the New York Islanders on Thursday night.

“Seeing the highlights of Nazem scoring his hat trick against the Islanders made me smile,” the New Jersey Devils coach said in a phone interview this weekend.

And, in the process, reminded DeBoer of some of the characteristics he feels Kadri shares with former Maple Leafs great Doug Gilmour.

Perhaps the biggest buzz created by Kadri came when he completed his hat trick with a brilliant individual toe-drag effort, one that caused the Twitter world to go crazy with suggestions that the jock strap belonging to Isles defenceman Lubomir Visnovsky was still lying on the Nassau Coliseum ice after he was deked out of it on the play.

Spectacular?

Absolutely.

Unexpected?

Not for DeBoer, Kadri’s junior coach during the 2006-07 and 07-08 seasons.

“I’ve seen that goal before,” DeBoer said with a chuckle. “I know he’s capable of that.

“I’m not surprised how Naz is doing right now. He’s a very special talented kid.”

When DeBoer speaks of Kadri’s God-given talents, he notes the unique mixture of skills and determination possessed by the London, Ont., native.

But it is the intangibles that add to the Kadri mystique, especially the fierce competitiveness that leaves him refusing to back down from players who are much bigger than he is, no matter what the consequences.

“He’s always played like that, even when I coached him in junior,” DeBoer said.

“He’s always played with an edge.

“He plays with the same edge as Doug Gilmour did.”

Whoa there.

Wait a minute.

Praising a 22-year-old up-and-coming prospect is all fine and good.

But comparing a part of his game to that of the Hall of Famer Gilmour, well, is that fair?

We quickly remind DeBoer that, especially in southern Ontario, Gilmour still is revered as a kind of modern-day hockey legend among Leafs fans.

Even two decades after he and Wendel Clark helped lead the Leafs on their Cinderella 1993 playoff run, No. 93 can still elicit standing ovations at the Air Canada Centre whenever he is shown sitting in the stands.

To mention the name of a youngster like Kadri in the same sentence as that of Gilmour certainly raises expectations in a hockey-crazed market such as Toronto.

“I’m aware of that,” said DeBoer, a native of the southern Ontario town of Dunnville.

“But that’s how much I believe in this kid.

“He really does play with an edge like Doug Gilmour. He’s not scared of anyone out there.”

If DeBoer had not already raised the bar for Kadri with his Gilmour comment, he then offered up more high praise.

“This is a kid you win championships with,” DeBoer proclaimed.

“He helped us win one (OHL) in Kitchener in 2007-08.”

In two seasons playing under the DeBoer-led Rangers, Kadri scored 32 goals and added 55 assists for 87 points in 130 games.

In the process, he was the recipient of some tough love from the then-Kitchener bench boss, tactics that, in the end, made Kadri a better player.

Asked the other day who the toughest coach he had ever played for, Kadri immediately said DeBoer.

“His nickname is Pistol Pete for a reason,” Kadri said.

“He was hard on us.”

On Monday, Pistol Pete will bring his Devils to the Air Canada Centre to face off against the Leafs.

In preparing for that game, DeBoer admits his team will pay special attention to Kadri — specifically, how to stop him.

“The way he’s played, he has earned (that kind of respect)” DeBoer said.

“I’m so happy for him. Great kid and a great family.

“In Kitchener, it’s very hard to get Ranger tickets. I think players were allotted two per game.

“I remember after Naz joined us, his dad Sam, a great guy, came in and asked if there was any way to get seven or eight per game. The whole family wanted to come to see him play.”

These days, all of Leafs Nation is clamouring to see Kadri strut his stuff first-hand.

Especially now that he is being mentioned in the same breath as Doug Gilmour.

GILMOUR HAS HEARD THE COMPARISONS

Doug Gilmour has heard the comparisons to Nazem Kadri before.

Informed that Kadri’s junior coach in Kitchener, Peter DeBoer, said the young forward “plays with the same edge as Doug Gilmour,” No. 93 acknowledged being familiar with the analogy.

“I remember my friend Mark Hunter, the GM of the London Knights, telling me, ‘Dougie, this kid plays hard and tough and competitively. He plays with the same edge as you did,’ ” Gilmour told the Toronto Sun on Saturday.

“From what I’ve seen, he plays hard,” Gilmour added.

“And there seems to be a lot of untapped skill there.”

Now the general manager in Kingston, Gilmour, during his tenure as bench boss of the Frontenacs, did coach against Kadri in the OHL.

“But he played in the other conference from us (with Kitchener and London) so we only faced him once or twice a season. That makes it difficult for me to say exactly what I picked up in his game,” Gilmour said.

“From being at the (Leaf games) and what I’ve seen on TV, though, I like what I’ve seen.”

Maple Leafs' Kadri starting to resemble Gilmour

When Peter DeBoer clicked on the tube Friday morning, the sight of one of his former pupils dominating at the NHL level put a huge grin on his face.

There was Nazem Kadri, DeBoer’s ex-student with the Kitchener Rangers of the Ontario Hockey League, scoring his first professional hat trick in a 5-4 overtime victory for the Maple Leafs against the New York Islanders on Thursday night.

“Seeing the highlights of Nazem scoring his hat trick against the Islanders made me smile,” the New Jersey Devils coach said in a phone interview this weekend.

And, in the process, reminded DeBoer of some of the characteristics he feels Kadri shares with former Maple Leafs great Doug Gilmour.

In a Maple Leafs dressing room too
often stuffed with inflated egos,
personal agendas and a greater concern
for personal stats rather than the
overall standings, the arrivals of
Mike Babcock and, now, Lou Lamoriello,
are a sobering reality check for all
concerned.